Greece, Part Six: Santorini, On Our Own, Day 1

Lying on a slab of concrete with my Ipod in, I was strangely relaxed considering I didn’t have any idea how we were going to get home or where “home” even was from here. For an island that was so touristy, it sure was hard to get around Santorini on your own.

It was our first “non busabout” day in the Greek Islands, after bidding the group goodbye the night before. We opted for a relaxed day visiting the Red Beach, which we only briefly got to visit the day before.

Red Beach

After a nice sleep in, we checked out of our room and checked into Katerina and John Hotel. Definitely more hostel than hotel, and the princess in me was a little turned off by the room at first sight, but it ended up being fine and I got a good sleep and didn’t get bed bugs, which for me is an accommodation win!

We then walked to the bus stop. There was no real indication of when the bus would come but we assumed it was the right place because there was a group of tourists waiting there as well. After waiting for 5 minutes, I asked some of the people gathered if they knew what time the bus was coming. They told me they had no idea but they had been waiting for ages with no sight of a bus and weren’t even sure if it was coming. Uh oh, not a good sign. I reported my findings to Carly and Mel and we discussed what we should do. It was decided that maybe we should try our luck walking to the beach instead (some of the people gathered at the bus stop had said that was one option, although would be a very long walk). The walk in the heat, hunger from no breakfast plus the uncertainty if we were even headed in the right direction did result in some bickering and we ended up deciding walking was probably not the smartest option and we could re-evaluate over some breakfast. So we headed to the bakery, located across from the bus stop. And I guess the universe decided to be kind to us because just as we were finishing up our breakfast, I spotted a bus coming down the road, so we bolted for it and made it in time!

Once arriving at Red Beach, we stopped for lunch and the people there were so nice and gave us a free dessert- yogurt with honey, topped with a honeyed/caramelised tomato. I’m usually not a fan of tomatoes but I loved these sweetened ones and sadly haven’t seen them around since.

We then beached it up on Red Beach (another rocky beach so bit hard to get comfortable if you don’t want to pay for a sun lounge, like us). Funnily enough, while we were lying there we spotted two German girls that had been waiting for the bus. Turned out the girls also gave up on waiting for the bus so decided to walk- which took them over an hour! Poor girls!

Getting home from the beach was a total disaster, we just missed a bus which was too full to take anyone so we made ourselves comfortable, settling in with our music devices on some slabs with hope that a bus would eventually come, as we had no idea how to walk home and there were no taxis. It must have nearly an hour but a bus did finally arrive.

Starting to feel a little under the weather (we had gotten sick in Paros), we decided instead of a night out we would indulge in a big, decadent dinner. We picked a cute restaurant by the water and ordered four appetisers and a main each. When we considered ordering more, the waiter told us enough! Never had staff tell us to stop ordering, but he was right, we struggled to finish it all. And despite advising us to stop ordering, the waiter bought us each a slice of orange cake with banana ice cream on the house, which we thought was very sweet.

Despite the public transport mishaps, we did have a nice, relaxing day which was topped off with two free desserts!